palmOne released Tungsten T5, Zire 72 and Zire 31
The new Tungsten T5, Zire 72 and Zire 31 are out now!!! I'm always a big fan of Palm OS PDA. palmOne Inc. had released 3 new powerful Palm PDAs that offers new features that suit different kind of people. This also marks the debut of the new Palm OS Garnet 5.4 for Tungsten T5 and Palm OS 5.2.8 for Zire 72 and Zire 31. Zire 72 and Zire 31 actually had been in the market for almost 1/2 a year but I did not manage to review them.

Zire 72
The Zire 72 features a built-in 1 megapixels digital camera and Intel PXA270 312 MHz MMX processor. It has 32MB of ram, 320X320 pixels TFT transflective colour screen, Bluetooth connectivity, video and sound recording capabilities and more. It supports MMC, SD and SDIO expansion cards. The speaker and microphone are on the back of the PDA. The sliding design of Zire 71 is no longer incorporated on this model. The placement of the speaker is rather weird as you hand might block the speaker it you are holding it (Ofcourse we hold in on the palm, it is a "palm"). It rather dissapointing that the lens is not being protected. So if you accidentally scratch it, then the camera is spoilt.

The Zire 72 works well as a full featured multimedia PDA. It can captures full motion video with sound unlimitedly (Depends on the size of the expansion card). It is not native Quicktime or WMV file for the video taken and you need to covert the video to Windows readable format. The digital still camera provides decent quality images (Ok, it is not a digital camera but it is good enough for a PDA). The 32MB RAM is rather low as it has only 24MB usable. If you have to store a large amount of programs, it is advisable to get an expansion card. Overall it is a good value for money PDA. One thing that I really dont like the Zire 72 is the ugly casing which looks like cheap plastic. The absence of WI-FI is a set off as Sony already done on its two new models, if you want to get connected to any hotspot, you may have to buy the optional WI-FI card from palmOne

Tungsten T5
The Tungsten T5 was a huge dissapointment for most palmOne supporters. Despite some new little changes it've done on the T5, some functions had been removed. The sound recording function is gone. The sliding design is also gone. It is more like an enhanced version of Tungsten E rather than an executive PDA. The package includes only sync-cable (no cradle?), travel charger, software CDs, manuals, flip cover and the PDA. It is kind of surprising as there is no luxurious goodies come with the PDA. The price tag of 299 Dollar is same as the price of a newly introduced T3.

Ok, these are some of the basic specs, I will not comment a lot on this PDA since it is almost same as a T3:
Intel PXA 270 416MHz, Palm OS Garnet 5.4, 256MB Memory(215MB actual storage capacity: 160MB internal flash drive, 55MB program memory for applications and data.), supports SD, SDIO and MultiMediaCard� expansion cards, Bluetooth connectivity.

Yet again, there is no built-in WI-FI. Like Zire 72, optional SDIO card is required for WI-FI. The only special thing on this model is the 160MB flash drive that works as a USB flash drive in Win 2000/XP/ME. The new model also uses non-volatile memory to store date which will not be lost when the battery losses its power. The universal connector is replace but a new "multi-connector" that will soon be used on all future models. The Palm OS Garnet is nothing much of an improved version of OS 5 with new added features.

Zire 31
I will have a more detailed review on this low end model in another upcoming review. Anyway the basic specs of the model are Intel PXA255 200MHz Processor, 16MB RAM, 65k Color 160x160 CSTN Screen, Palm OS 5.2.8 and MMC/SD/SDIO slot.

For more infomation,  please check out: www.palmOne.com